Dominique Moody: Our Garden of Dreams
The Nomad, Dominique Moody
Seminal and visionary artist, Dominique Moody was the Artist-in-Residence for the fall of 2018 at Side Street Projects! As part of the residency, Dominique created a mobile community garden called, Our Garden of Dreams, “to create a space where something can grow that is magical. And nurture that environment is the most essential form of appreciation of the aesthetic world. With care, our garden of dreams will grow, and along with that a creative spirit.”
This project was rooted in assemblage sculpture and utilized all mediums including those that are ethereal and temporal that include elements like water, wind, and light. The community played an integral role in completing the mobile garden. The project invited the community to reflect on our history and creatively imagine our future dreams together, and watch them grow. Dominique led 6 workshops for families and neighbors that focused on themes in the Our Garden of Dreams project, including teaching new skills that include gardening, assemblage making, and repurposing objects.
We need your help! Please donate old windows, empty bottles, rusty hinges, and other knick-knacks. The windows used in the structure of the garden will be adorned with dreams, drawings, and poems from workshop attendees and off-site community partnerships affiliated with the project.
BIO
Dominique Moody’s creative journey began early in life, as the sixth of nine children born of African-American parents in 1950s Germany. As a military family they moved about frequently.
However once the family returned to the states this pattern of moving from place to place continued and through these experiences came her first language, “creativity” which played a vital role to communicate her thoughts and ideas to others. These tools of expression and insight included the way in which her eclectic surrounding formed a rich tapestry of aesthetic influences.
But the movement from place to place also provided Dominique with an understanding about architecture and the art of having to create and recreate home over and over again in different environments and circumstances.
Yet her stability was maintained by the family’s idea that “home resided within them, no matter where they were”.
Drawn to the art of portraiture and storytelling Dominique honed her skills using traditional practices. Her departure from these processes occurred in her late 20s when her eyesight begin to deteriorate.
Creatively though this terrifying challenge brought into being a new way of seeing.
She begin to explore using collage and assemblage materials for her visual expressions. Her tools were more familiar to the garage than a traditional art studio.
Her body of studio work reflected the narratives of family, of home, of culture and dreams which brought forth visions of her past and future possibilities.
For her, education took many forms first from home then to the streets of New York and the studios at Pratt Institute, to San Francisco’s Haight – Ashbury and UCBerkeley, to Los Angeles and the Watts Towers. Her mentors were many and guided her to seek her own path. She’s been honored with a Phi Beta Kappa and her BA in the Arts at Berkeley along with additional grants and scholarships.
Forty-six moves later, Dominique’s dream of her nomadic art home is now being realized in the footprint of a tiny mobile dwelling titled “NOMAD46 an artist residence on wheels. She now creates site specific works along her journey. Trailblazing an unchartered path ahead but hoping that many will be inspired by her life through art along the way.
